After an act of sabotage brings down the SHIELD Helicarrier, Fury's team risks their lives to extract the machine's powerful energy core only to have it stolen from them in a raid by Hydra agents attacking from a massive AIM ship leaving Agent Quartermain and several others in critical condition. Fury has enough to worry about when one of his deepest cover agents, Rollins, calls him in to his post at Roxxon Chemical with dire news about a mysterious Project Delta, a name that reminds Fury of a proposed SHIELD retraining program that didn't get off the ground. Rollins leads Fury to Roxxon's mainframe where their Delta turns out to be a collection of highly classified data on SHIELD operatives and technology. If that wasn't disturbing enough, they spot from the shadows a group of hooded figures carrying the stolen power core.

News breaks at SHIELD Headquarters the next day of Quartermain's passing. Nick can barely process it on top of what he's learned at Roxxon. He reports everything to SHIELD's shadowy supervising council and demands immediate authorization to raid Roxxon for the core and the sensitive data, but they suspiciously give him the runaround, secretly plotting to stop him. Rollins is soon caught at Roxxon by Agent Woo, and when Fury is called back to the council, they have Rollins there refuting his earlier report. Realizing just how deep the conspiracy to undermine SHIELD from within has gone, Fury makes a break for it. The council orders all agents to stop him, but Nick's closest friends, having no idea what's happening, are naturally reluctant. Dum Dum stops Rollins from shooting Nick, giving him his chance to escape.

Solicit Synopsis

For years, Nick Fury has led S.H.I.E.L.D. But the spy network has become corrupt and Fury's got to go underground to fight it... even though it means fighting— and killing— some of his closest friends as well!

Notes

This issue is reprinted in comics and books, see references for more info.[2]